Saul Alinsky and the Gang of Eight

Exactly who will benefit from the “immigration integration” in the Schumer-Rubio bill?

Immigration reform rally in Los Angeles, May 1, 2013.

National Review Online: At the press conference introducing their bill, the Gang of Eight evoked the spirit of Ted Kennedy. But the 24 pages of the 844-page bill (pages 370–94) dealing with “immigrant integration” stand as a rousing tribute to Saul Alinsky. If this bill becomes law, you can be sure, as night follows day, that federal dollars will pour into radical left-wing activist groups to promote “immigrant integration.”

On the surface, the bill’s provisions to “integrate” newcomers appear reasonable enough. Various projects are established to foster the “linguistic, economic, and civic integration of immigrants.” A public-private partnership is created; a pilot project is launched to provide funds to states, localities, and nonprofit organizations; and grants are awarded for the purpose of assisting “aliens who are preparing an initial application for registered provisional immigrant status” (i.e., legalization) and “legal permanent residents seeking to become naturalized United States Citizens.”

How will the “immigrant integration” section of the Schumer-Rubio bill work in practice? Let us examine how “immigrant integration” currently works in two states: Illinois and Maryland.

Illinois:
The State of Illinois established a Governor’s Office of New Americans (GONA) in 2006. The director of GONA declared, “Immigrant integration in the State of Illinois is made possible through our Strategic partnerships with community based organizations, local governments,” and various state agencies. GONA’s website specifically highlighted that its “strategic partnership” with the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights (ICIRR) receives “national recognition.” The ICIRR will undoubtedly become a major beneficiary of the Schumer-Rubio proposal.

The major figure behind the ICIRR is longtime radical activist Joshua Hoyt. Stanley Kurtz in his powerful exposé Radical-in-Chief noted that Hoyt collaborated with Barak Obama and former terrorist Bill Ayers on issues related to the Woods Fund of Chicago, as it dispensed funds to radical groups such as ACORN. Hoyt was associated with the original Saul Alinsky front group, the Industrial Areas Foundation. Under Hoyt’s leadership, the ICIRR led successful campaigns to gain state support for illegal immigrants’ access to in-state college tuition, preschool, and health benefits, and secured recognition for foreign-consular (matricula consular) identity cards. Hoyt and ICIRR also supported Islamic groups that were resisting law-enforcement examinations of suspicious Muslim charities, and they worked with others to pass an Illinois law mandating that detainees for immigration violations have access to “religious counseling” (often from radical imams.)

On July 8, 2012, the ICIRR hosted “Electoral Organizing training designed for people who are planning to run electoral or issue campaigns in 2012.” Participating in the ICIRR’s electoral training was a close ally (listed on the ICIRR letterhead as an affiliated organization): the Council of Islamic Organizations of Greater Chicago (CIOGC). This group works closely with the Islamist (and Muslim Brotherhood–aligned) Islamic Council of North America. The CIOGC, along with the ICIRR, as well as the radical Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, which is another official “strategic partner” of the Governor’s Office of New Americans, will clearly play important roles in any “immigrant integration” in Illinois.

Maryland:
At the center of immigrant integration is CASA de Maryland (originally Central American Solidarity Association) and its executive director, Gustavo Torres. CASA has tremendous influence in state politics both with the legislature and with Governor Martin O’Malley. Torres was co-chair of O’Malley’s transition team. He is a key member of the Maryland Council for New Americans, which advises O’Malley, and he chairs its working group on citizenship issues.

Torres left his native Colombia to support the Sandinista revolution in Nicaragua in the 1980s. According to the Washington Post, he was a Sandinista journalist who met his first wife, an American Sandinista sympathizer and “advocate for reproductive health,” in Nicaragua. The Sandinistas, it is worth remembering, were officially Marxist-Leninists — that is to say, Communists. In other words, during the Cold War struggle against Communism, Gustavo Torres of CASA de Maryland was not on the side of the free world, and he continues to this day to be a critic of Reagan’s anti-Communist policies.

Torres became executive director of CASA in 1993 and a U.S. citizen in 1995. In 2007 he spoke at a Chávez-funded conference in Venezuela on “revolution” in Latin America. Shortly thereafter, from 2008 to 2010, CASA received $1.5 million in funding from the Chávez regime. Besides Chávez, CASA’s funders include the Maryland state government, the U.S. government, the Ford Foundation, and George Soros’s Open Society Institute.

CASA’s major activities consist of opposing federal, state, and local enforcement of immigration laws. Representative Dana Rohrabacher (R., Calif.) has charged CASA with “aiding and abetting criminal activity” by teaching illegal immigrants “how to circumvent the law.” On May Day in 2008, CASA organized a demonstration that included contingents from the American Communist Party and the Socialist Workers Party. Not surprisingly, CASA and Torres are strong supporters of the “Cuban Five,” five Castro spies convicted by the American government, whose cause has become trendy for the international Left.

We can be sure that “immigrant integration” will work in the Senate bill the same way it currently works in the states. The left-wing groups that will benefit from the “Alinsky” section of the Schumer-Rubio bill include the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, the Service Employees International Union, La Raza, the Asian Law Caucus, the National Immigration Law Center, CASA, the Massachusetts Immigrant and Refugee Advocacy Coalition, and various organizations supported by Islamists and the Muslim Brotherhood. National Review readers have been alerted to the activities of these groups particularly through the writings of Stanley Kurtz, as well as David Horowitz and Jacob Laksin, co-authors of The New Leviathan.

As Lenin used to say, Cui bono? Who benefits? So who benefits from pages 370–94 of the Schumer-Rubio bill? Schumer knows. Does Rubio?

— John Fonte, a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, is the author of Sovereignty or Submission: Will Americans Rule Themselves or be Ruled by Others?

Related:

Illegal Border Crossings Rise in South Texas as Congress Debated Immigration

Dissecting the Gang of 8′s enforcement sham

Sessions: Gang Of Eight Bill Would Surge Low-Skill Immigration, Hurt

Alinsky Still Alive and Well at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner

Amnesty – Solidifying the Marxist Control of America for Decades, If Not Permanently

Immigration Alert: Waivers And Exemptions In Gang Of Eight Plan Would Permanently Hamstring Enforcement

Technorati Tags: Saul Alinksky,Gang of 8,Gang of Eight,Alinsky,Chuck Schumer,Marco Rubio,John McCain,Progressivism,immigration,amnesty bill,Amnesty,watch the other hand,sovereignty,submission,George Soros,choices,CASA,Marxists,radicals in the White House,May Day,David Horowitz,La Raza,Schumer-Rubio bill,immigration integration

Help Save USMC Sergeant Rex

Please contract your U.S. Senator, Senator Chuck Schumer, USMC or Air Force Secretary Michael Donley, who oversees military service dog training to help save Sgt. Rex and unite him in retirement with his partner Marine Cpl. Megan Leavey.

Marine Cpl. Meagan Leavey and her canine partner, Sgt. Rex, were trained to detect roadside bombs and other materials. Now, she's trying to adopt him before he's put to sleep.

‘REX is my partner. I love him’ – Retired marine fights to adopt military dog before it’s put to sleep.

The Blaze Marine Cpl. Megan Leavey served with her four-legged partner Sgt. Rex through two tours in Iraq, completing hundreds of missions searching for roadside bombs until an insurgent explosion took them both out of service.

More than five years later, Leavey, 28, is fighting to adopt the dog she handled since her earliest days as a Marine before the German shepherd is put to sleep.

“Rex is my partner, I love him,” Leavey, who lives with her father in Rockport, N.Y. and works as a dog handler, told MSNBC. “We have been through so much together…I’ve spent day and night with this dog. It’s a very strong bond.”

Leavey was discharged in Dec. 2007, but Rex — considered a valuable work dog — was put back in service after he recovered from his injuries. That was until a month ago, when he was diagnosed with a kind of nerve paralysis that left him unable to serve, the Westchester Journal News reported.

It’s now a race against the clock as Leavey struggles to cut through military red tape and adopt Rex before he is put down. “As a safety precaution, they don’t give all dogs away,” she told the Journal News. She said Rex, a strong “alpha dog,” never hurt anyone he wasn’t supposed to.

“The dilemma with me is the minute they say he can’t be adopted, because he‘s sick and because he can’t work, they’d have to put him to sleep,” she said. “Not because he’s too sick to live a good life, but because they can‘t utilize him so it wouldn’t make sense for them to keep a dog they’re not going to work at the kennels. I don’t want to let that happen.”

But time is ticking, she said. “This is not [the Marines'] first priority,” Leavey told New York Fox affiliate WNYW-TV. “A lot of times it gets lost in the shuffle.”

To help speed the process up, she reached out to veteran’s organizations and to Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.), who sent a letter to Air Force Secretary Michael Donley, who oversees military service dog training. In the letter, Schumer detailed the relationship Leavey and Rex had and credited them with saving countless lives, according to the Journal News.

If Leavey’s request is granted, Rex will enjoy a sizable home with a fenced-in yard. Until she hears more, all she can do is wait. “It’s a partnership,” Leavey told the newspaper. “I feel like I know Rex so well. I’m so looking forward to seeing him again.”  barenakedislam

Sergeant Rex: The Few. The Proud. The Marine K-9 that Must Get Home

What will it take to realize the contributions that dogs provide to humanity in peacetime and in war? If you’re going to say a cup of Alpo, then maybe you should own a cat. Seriously. Without question, dogs have proven their place within the echelon of our combat fighters serving overseas. At home, they’re just as capable of saving lives, detecting cancer, building morale, helping the blind or just making you laugh. Some of them can even dial 911 nowadays.

They know your quirks. They understand you too damn well. They can sense your enemies. No matter what they persevere through in life, they without question will remain by your side until the very end.

Maybe you think that sounds a bit “extreme” for some folks who don’t see dogs taking their rightful place by the side of man (and women). Well if you’ve ever been crossing a street wondering when the next IED will go off around you, then you’d probably have a change of thought. I could not even imagine doing this, let alone having a furry companion by my side wondering what danger the next dark, dusty, street corner could bring. The more we look at our dogs as accessories, the more damage we’re doing to their existence. We are short changing the number one species on this planet that can help progress humans beyond our own character flaws. Put a peace-preaching animal lover in the same room with a hard-as-nails veteran K-9 handler and rest assured they will have a lot in common. How many people do you know are capable of loving you for who you are while at the same time taking a bullet for you – without question?

Steadfast loyalty, trust, and instinct are something that no cruise missile or predator drone can ever come close to. You can enhance weapons system all you want, but a dog will get by in the field without tools, batteries, or even body armor. The evolution of our dogs in war did not require a circuit board upgrade, they simply adapt by nature. During World War I they were tasked with killing rats in the trenches. Today they faithfully serve our soldiers as patrol dogs, IED detectors, scouts, messengers, and even parachute behind enemy lines. One could argue that, along with our omnipotent United States Army Rangers, our war dogs will always “lead the way“.

During two dangerous tours of duty in Iraq, a German Shepard named “Sergeant Rex” lead the way along with his handler, Corporal Megan Leavey. Both of them were severely injured in an IED attack. As you can imagine and IED can inflict as much mental damage as physical damage to a soldier. These scars do not stay in Iraq. They come home with you. Her K-9 partner does not just deserve “to come home”. It is required that Rex comes home to be with Megan and live a normal life that he earned, as did Megan, in Rockland County, NY.

Sergeant Rex, at 10 years old and considered no longer serving, probably possesses the same stubbornness and vigor as General George S. Patton. Old and wise beyond his years, seeing firsthand the intensity of combat, his situation is mired in “bureaucratic red tape”. Our politicians say they are trying to “work the channels” so Megan and Rex can be reunited through adoption.

A battalion of Marines, gear, and tech can be deployed anywhere in the world within 24 hours or less. You’re going to tell Corporal Levy that you can’t fast track a dog adoption? You don’t need a government accountant to figure this out. After all, our politicians fly luxury jets across the country to attend cocktail parties and rallies. Wouldn’t it be nice if he could hitch a ride back to New York?

Imagine a dog that saves your life in war, only to be left behind while you go home to relive, re-imagine, and repeat every nightmare scenario that you encountered during your tour(s). Now imagine this dog, who probably saved countless other Marines, has to sit in a kennel with other dogs – only waiting to be put to sleep.

Fellow soldiers recount their experiences with each other as a form of therapy. Sergeant Rex, alongside Megan, forged through blood, sweat, and fire must start a new life and serve his country in a civilian capacity. Like two old soldier buddies sitting on the porch recounting their days in Korea or Nam, you simply cannot deny this companionship. It is a companionship that leads the way for humanity.  by gspecadmin on March 10, 2012

BNI READER Barbara kindly gave us a link to Baghdad Pups. I’m going to write to them and see if they can help with this. Maybe you can too: OPERATION BAGHDAD PUPS

Source: Just One More Pet

What’s Really Behind Obama’s New Push for Gun Control?

Despite the Libyan crisis and ongoing problems with America’s massive deficit, last week President Obama decided it was time to focus on gun control. He wrote an op-ed, challenged the NRA to negotiate new gun control regulations, and met with gun control groups.

Of course, Obama’s op-ed says he supports gun rights. Yet, he also emphasizes that he doesn’t want people to “shout at one another” and supports “reasonable laws.” Alas, this is simply positioning for the 2012 presidential election and does not accurately describe his true agenda on gun control.

Obama claimed in his op-ed: “My administration has not curtailed the rights of gun owners, it has expanded them, including allowing people to carry their guns in national parks and wildlife refuges.” But he conveniently forgot to mention that he never initiated or supported this legislation. Instead, it was forced upon Obama by a large majority of Congress passing an amendment to a bill that he wanted passed, the “Cardholders’ Bill of Rights Act of 2009.” Just because Obama wasn’t willing to veto a bill he wanted hardly shows support for the right to self-defense.

Indeed, Obama has been a consistent opponent of gun ownership. He enacted a ban on the importation of semiautomatic guns because, “The U.S. insisted that imports of the aging rifles could cause problems such as firearm accidents.” He has proposed much more extensive reporting requirements on sales of long guns. Obama’s nomination of anti-gun Andrew Traver to head the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosivesthreatens imposing many new regulations. Still further, the Obama administration has actively pushed for the U.N.’s Arms Trade Treaty and continues to make inaccurate statements about the source of Mexico’s crime guns.

And look at the judges President Obama nominated to the Supreme Court. Both Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan have proven themselves to be adamantly against any protection for individual ownership of guns. The stark reality is if Justices Alito, Scalia, Roberts, Thomas, or Kennedy were to die or retire, the two precedents set in both the Washington, D.C. and Chicago gun bans would be threatened as these were narrow 5 to 4 decisions.

The president’s op-ed did not exactly present compelling logic for new gun laws. Everyone is concerned about potential future mass shootings like the incident in Tucson  in early January, which left six dead and 13 wounded including Rep. Gabrielle Giffords.

But we go from his concern that “A man our Army rejected as unfit for service; a man one of our colleges deemed too unstable for studies; a man apparently bent on violence, was able to walk into a store and buy a gun” to a call for more background checks as the solution. Yet, Mr. Obama neither advocates eliminating the military’s privacy guarantee nor does he even discuss the objections to making such a change (such as it preventing recruits from talking openly). Instead, he makes vague promises for legislation that would correct “porous background checks.”

Everyone wants a perfect, almost magical solution that will stop criminals from getting their hands on guns. But, unfortunately, background checks do not stop bad guys from getting their hands on guns. Not a single academic study by economists or criminologists has found that the Brady Act or any state background checks has reduced violent crime.

Instead, the Brady Act background checks for gun purchases, in place since 1994, are a problem for law-abiding citizens. Hardly ever do background checks deny guns to criminals. Over 99.9 percent of purchases initially flagged as being illegal under the law were “false positives” – law-abiding citizens incorrectly identified as banned individuals.

Take the numbers for 2008, the latest year with data available. The 78,906 initial denials resulted in only 147 cases involving banned individuals trying to purchase guns being referred to prosecutors. Of those 147 cases, prosecutors thought the evidence was strong enough to prosecute only 105, and they won convictions in just 43. But few of these 43 cases involved career criminals or those who posed real threats. The typical case was someone who had a misdemeanor conviction for an offense he didn’t realize prevented him from buying a gun.

Even those who aren’t prevented from buying a gun face delays in getting approved. Eight percent of the National Instant Criminal Background Check System checks are “not resolved immediately.” Two-thirds of those checks take up to 3 business days, and the rest take even longer, though these further delays can’t stop one from obtaining a gun at that point.

Others would greatly add to these errors by banning more people from buying guns. Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY) proposes that those who have been arrested, but neither charged nor convicted, for illegal drug violations should be denied buying guns. If prosecutors don’t believe that enough evidence exists to charge someone with a marijuana possession, isn’t there a reasonable chance that they are innocent?

The president isn’t alone in pushing for more gun-control. But at least these other politicians, such as Schumer and Mayor Bloomberg, are a lot more forthright about their intentions than Obama. Perhaps that should be so so surprising since Obama will soon face re-election in all parts of the country, including in those areas that he famously labeled as being populated by “bitter” Americans who “cling to their guns, cling to their  religion,” not just a smaller Democratic-leaning constituency.

Source:  Back to Basics

Related:

Obama Executive Orders Impose New Gun Rules

Dept. of Education buys Shotguns.  First the IRS… now the DOE!

Columbine Remembered  -  Great Speech by Columbine Parent

There Is No First Amendment Without the Second Amendment!

And remember the words of Thomas Jefferson "The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government." See Video of Suzanna Gratia-Hupp’s Congressional Testimony: What the Second Amendment is REALLY For, (u-tube) HERE.

DOH! Extreme Leftist Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY) Reveals Democrat Strategy For Budget Bill & Rubio (R-FL) on Not Raising Debt Ceiling

Posted by Jared Law on March 29, 2011 at 10:01pm in Elections, Issues, News, & Politics

• Send Message View Discussions

This is rich, especially coming from such an extreme, radical leftist like Chuck Schumer. Talk about the soot-encrusted pot calling the gleaming, polished-stainless steel kettle (with a solid copper bottom) black!

The fact of the matter is that the Democrats in 'leadership' positions in the U.S. Senate are hardcore, radical leftists. Many who call themselves Communists are just as far left, as Chuck Schumer, Harry Reid, Frank Lautenberg, and other 'Progressives' in the Democrat party.

It's nice to see what we all know is happening, exposed to the light of day. Those dirty, radical leftists can't hide their scheming to combine against the liberty of the American People forever; thankfully, we have examples to show potential recruits to our cause. Cold, hard evidence which cannot be explained away by the honest and honorable.
--------

On a Senate Call, a Glimpse of Marching Orders

By JENNIFER STEINHAUER | March 29, 2011, 12:30 PM 4:58 p.m. | Updated: Um, senators, ever heard of the mute button?

Moments before a conference call with reporters was scheduled to get underway on Tuesday morning, Charles E. Schumer of New York, the No. 3 Democrat in the Senate, apparently unaware that many of the reporters were already on the line, began to instruct his fellow senators on how to talk to reporters about the contentious budget process.

After thanking his colleagues — Barbara Boxer of California, Benjamin L. Cardin of Maryland, Thomas R. Carper of Delaware and Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut — for doing the budget bidding for the Senate Democrats, who are facing off against the House Republicans over how to cut spending for the rest of the fiscal year, Mr. Schumer told them to portray John A. Boehner of Ohio, the speaker of the House, as painted into a box by the Tea Party, and to decry the spending cuts that he wants as extreme. “I always use the word extreme,” Mr. Schumer said. “That is what the caucus instructed me to use this week.”

A minute or two into the talking-points tutorial, though, someone apparently figured out that reporters were listening, and silence fell.

Then the conference call began in earnest, with the Democrats right on message.

“We are urging Mr. Boehner to abandon the extreme right wing,” said Ms. Boxer, urging the House to compromise on the scale of spending cuts and to drop proposed amendments that would deny federal financing for Planned Parenthood and for government agencies like the Environmental Protection Agency.

Mr. Carper continued with the theme, referring to some House Republicans’ “right-wing extremist friends.” Mr. Cardin decried Mr. Boehner’s giving into “extremes of his party.” Mr. Blumenthal closed by speaking of the “relatively small extreme group of ideologues” who are “an anchor” dragging down the budget negotiation process.
How news is made . . .

Update: Later in the day, Mr. Schumer’s spokesman, Brian Fallon, issued this statement about the senator’s remarks: “There’s nothing wrong with reporters overhearing him calling the House Republicans’ [position] extreme, because that’s what it is. He had just given a speech on the Senate floor saying the same thing. The sooner Speaker Boehner abandons the Tea Party’s extreme demands, the sooner there can be a bipartisan deal on the budget.”

--------
CAUGHT: REPORTERS OVERHEAR DEM’S SECRET BUDGET STRATEGY — ‘ALWAYS U...

Posted on March 29, 2011 at 2:21pm by Jonathon M. Seidl
“Um, Senators, ever heard of the mute button?”
That’s how the New York Times — yes the New York Times — begins its story on how Democratic Senators were caught Tuesday morning discussing secret marching orders before a conference call. Apparently, the senators didn’t realize that several of the reporters were already logged into the call and began discussing just how they wanted to verbally paint the GOP, House Speaker John Boehner, and the Tea Party.

The instructions came from the Senate’s No. 3 Democrat, New York’s Charles Schumer. The Times explains his instructions:

After thanking his colleagues — Barbara Boxer of California, Ben Cardin of Maryland, Tom Carper of Delaware and Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut — for doing the budget bidding for the Senate Democrats, who are facing off against the House Republicans over how spending for the rest of the fiscal year, Mr. Schumer told them to portray John Boehner of Ohio, the Speaker of the House, as painted into a box by the Tea Party, and to decry the spending cuts that he wants as extreme. “I always use the word extreme,” Mr. Schumer said, “That is what the caucus instructed me to use this week.” [Emphasis added]

Eventually, it seems someone did find that mute button. But Schumer‘s instructions didn’t fall on deaf ears. As soon as the call officially started the senators accomplished their mission:

“We are urging Mr. Boehner to abandon the extreme right wing,” said Ms. Boxer, urging the House to compromise on the scale of spending cuts and to drop proposed amendments that would deny federal financing for Planned Parenthood and for government agencies like the Environmental Protection Agency.

Mr. Carper continued with the theme, referring to some House Republicans’ “right-wing extremist friends.” Mr. Cardin decried Mr. Boehner giving into “extremes of his party.” Mr. Blumenthal closed by speaking of the “relatively small extreme group of ideologues” who are “an anchor” dragging down the budget negotiation process. [Emphasis added]

Sure, this isn‘t we’re-involved-in-a-third-war shocking — securing messaging is a fact of political life. But it is, if nothing else, worth a chuckle. Especially considering the Democrats — possibly oblivious to the gaffe — said exactly what they said they were going to say.

That, folks, is how the political sausage is made.

Why I Won't Vote to Raise the Debt Limit

Everyone in Washington knows how to cut spending. The time to start is now

By MARCO RUBIO

Americans have built the single greatest nation in all of human history. But America's exceptionalism was not preordained. Every generation has had to confront and solve serious challenges and, because they did, each has left the next better off. Until now.

Our generation's greatest challenge is an economy that isn't growing, alongside a national debt that is. If we fail to confront this, our children will be the first Americans ever to inherit a country worse off than the one their parents were given.

Current federal policies make it harder for job creators to start and grow businesses. Taxes on individuals are complicated and set to rise in less than two years. Corporate taxes will soon be the highest in the industrialized world. Federal agencies torment job creators with an endless string of rules and regulations.

On top of all this, we have an unsustainable national debt. Leaders of both parties have grown our government for decades by spending money we didn't have. To pay for it, they borrowed $4 billion a day, leaving us with today's $14 trillion debt. Half of that debt is held by foreign investors, mostly China. And there is no plan to stop. In fact, President Obama's latest budget request spends more than $46 trillion over the next decade. Under this plan, public debt will equal 87% of our economy in less than 10 years. This will scare away job creators and lead to higher taxes, higher interest rates and greater inflation.

Betting on America used to be a sure thing, but job creators see the warning signs that our leaders ignore. Even the world's largest bond fund, PIMCO, recently dumped its holdings of U.S. debt.

We're therefore at a defining moment in American history. In a few weeks, we will once again reach our legal limit for borrowing, the so-called debt ceiling. The president and others want to raise this limit. They say it is the mature, responsible thing to do.

In fact, it's nothing more than putting off the tough decisions until after the next election. We cannot afford to continue waiting. This may be our last chance to force Washington to tackle the central economic issue of our time.

"Raising America's debt limit is a sign of leadership failure." So said then-Sen. Obama in 2006, when he voted against raising the debt ceiling by less than $800 billion to a new limit of $8.965 trillion. As America's debt now approaches its current $14.29 trillion limit, we are witnessing leadership failure of epic proportions.

I will vote to defeat an increase in the debt limit unless it is the last one we ever authorize and is accompanied by a plan for fundamental tax reform, an overhaul of our regulatory structure, a cut to discretionary spending, a balanced-budget amendment, and reforms to save Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.

View Full Image

There is still time to accomplish all this. Rep. Dave Camp has already introduced proposals to lower and simplify our tax rates, close loopholes, and make permanent low rates on capital gains and dividends. Even Mr. Obama has endorsed the idea of lowering our corporate tax rate. Sen. Rand Paul, meanwhile, has a bill that would require an up-or-down vote on "major" regulations, those that cost the economy $100 million or more. And the House has already passed a spending plan this year that lowered discretionary spending by $862 billion over 10 years.

Such reductions are important, but nondefense discretionary spending is a mere 19% of the budget. Focusing on this alone would lead to draconian cuts to essential and legitimate programs. To get our debt under control, we must reform and save our entitlement programs.

No changes should be made to Medicare and Social Security for people who are currently in the system, like my mother. But people decades away from retirement, like me, must accept that reforms are necessary if we want Social Security and Medicare to exist at all by the time we are eligible for them.

Finally, instead of simply raising the debt limit, we should reassure job creators by setting a firm statutory cap on our public debt-to-GDP ratio. A comprehensive plan would wind down our debt to sustainable levels of approximately 60% within a decade and no more than half of the economy shortly thereafter. If Congress fails to meet these debt targets, automatic across-the-board spending reductions should be triggered to close the gap. These public debt caps could go in tandem with a Constitutional balanced budget amendment.

Some say we will go into default if we don't increase the debt limit. But if we simply raise it once again, without a real plan to bring spending under control and get our economy growing, America faces the very real danger of a catastrophic economic crisis.

I know that by writing this, I am inviting political attack. When I proposed reforms to Social Security during my campaign, my opponent spent millions on attack ads designed to frighten seniors. But demagoguery is the last refuge of the spineless politician willing to do anything to win the next election.

Whether they admit it or not, everyone in Washington knows how to solve these problems. What is missing is the political will to do it. I ran for the U.S. Senate because I want my children to inherit what I inherited: the greatest nation in human history. It's not too late. The 21st century can also be the American Century. Our people are ready. Now it's time for their leaders to join them.

Mr. Rubio, a Republican, is a U.S. senator from Florida.

Related:

Red Ink Rumble | The American Spectator

Gun Control?

Watch this gal ream a congressional committee member at the hearing!

It Is Not About Duck Hunting... It is About All of Our Rights to Protect Ourselves From All of You (Tallking to the Congressional Committee) Up There!! ... Suzanna Gretia-Hupp

Watch Chuck Schumer’s Face

“The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as at last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government."

--Thomas Jefferson, Founding Father, Author of the Declaration of Independence, 2nd President of the United States...etc

Posted: Knowledge Creates Power